Sunday, July 15, 2012

Where's the Flat Part?

Tour guide for the climb suffering

Yesterday, I did something most sane, sedentary folks would find unreasonable: I set the alarm for 5 am on a Saturday - what? I was meeting Craig over at Memorial Park in Manitou Springs to run up Barr Trail as part of his Pikes Peak Marathon training. The plan for the day was A-Frame and back from the PPM start line, about a 20 mile round trip. Craig invited me along for all or any part of the trip so I figured why not? (BTW, I was the sherpa as Craig decided to travel light for race simulation reasons, therefore, the only photos of human suffering were taken by, not "of", the guy who carried his camera - ha!)

Early morning sun on the infamous "W's"

I would like to wax eloquent about how effortlessly we breezed up Ruxton Ave, sailing smoothly onto the lower sections of the Barr Trail with the cool morning air invigorating our running efforts. Of course, many of you have been on or heard of Barr Trail and you would know I was lying like a politician in an election year.The fact is, this run eats at your soul from the first steps onto Ruxton, bringing to life things like "barking calves", "flaming lungs", and all other manner of exercise induced suffering. And we call this recreation. Fun even. Aside from one measly effort long since pushed to the dusty corners of my memory bank, all other trips up Barr have included an entrance via The Incline. So when people warn about ruining your run on the W's, I don't always relate. I have a better appreciation for it now. In order to keep myself from blowing up, I let Craig set the pace.

The W's are indeed hard, but the issue is more the accumulated effect of constant climb and lowering oxygen. At lower elevations, you can "redline", realize the trouble you are in and cut back your effort. Generally speaking, at that point, you can recover within a run and carry on to finish your workout. However, at altitude, it seems that when you blow up, there is too much stacked against you to recover "during" your exercise. We have seen it time and again, whether on the bike or running, and that is why people like Matt Carpenter try to warn newbies on Pikes Peak to notch it back at the start... Anyway, back to the run.

Majesty

Barking calves aside, we settled in to a nice run. There was a LOT of traffic on Barr already, which we expected as Ruxton was packed with cars as we ran up. We chatted about PPM, the recent fires, life in general and pretty much settled into a nice flow up the mountain. It was funny as several folks commented about things such as "Look, they are running and can still talk", or "Why hurry, it will still be there when you get there?" - normal trail chatter. One thing is for sure, it was good to see folks out enjoying the trails and happy to be alive. The city was in a bit of a fire-induced coma for a few weeks, but in general life is getting back to a "new normal". Above about 9000' feet or so, my recent nemesis breathing issues started howling at me and my ribcage suddenly felt like it had the capacity of an infant. Not sure what's up with that, but have been bending some earsto help me get it figured out. I will need the big-boy lungs for some outings I would like to squeeze in before summer's end :)

Barr Camp is Hoppin'!

We hit Barr Camp (7.5 miles in and 10,200 feet above sea level) in about 1:54, which is good for me since I really haven't ever done this exact route. I guess it is a PR - woohoo.... And Barr Camp was jamming with folks - I had to wait for about a dozen people to clear out to get the photo above. This at 8 am. We hung out for a while, did some stretching, and then I decided to head back down. I felt bad to leave Craig on his own to A-Frame, but at the same time, I knew my lungs were stressing pretty good and another 1800' up wasn't going to help them out. So Craig headed up, and I started the descent back to Manitou - all 4300' of it!

Great Views

I paused at a couple favorite spots on the way down to look at the beauty of all that surrounds Pikes Peak. Given that three weeks ago the harsh reality was that all this could burn if the fire jumped Highway 24, it was all the more reason to pause for the awe of where we live and what we get to do on any given Saturday. We are quite thankful for that and not a day passes that we take it for granted. Return trip down was 1:14, certainly not speedy but I felt good the whole way down. The round trip ended up just over 15 miles for me on the day, with 4300' accumulated gain. Oh, and by the way, there is NO flat part, just in case you were wondering. And I got in some "weight training" at the end of the run. I needed to stop at Coquette's in Manitou for gluten-free flour, so I finished the last .3 miles of the run carrying a 4lb bag of flour under each arm ;-)

Shoes - Brooks Pure Grit

Snyder Quarry and Cave of the Winds

There is not really an overlook to the north where you can see Waldo Canyon, so this was about as close as I could photograph, looking a little northeast. The visible scar on the far hillside is Snyder Quarry, and right below it is the Cave of the Winds. The burn area to the west is Williams Canyon, which is being rated extreme on the burn severity index, along with Waldo Canyon just a bit further west. Waldo will most likely re-open eventually, but will look totally different than what we have ever seen, which is sad but is also the cycle of life and nature.

Back a few weeks...

June 26: Pre-Evacuation notice went out about 2:15pm - this is at 3:15pm from our driveway

June 26: At 3:30pm, it became mandatory for good reason

June 26: 6:15pm - From the eastern edges of Colorado Springs -We stood in my sister's driveway and cried for our neighborhood

We have thought quite a few times over the last weeks about a post to gather all our thoughts
concerning the Waldo Canyon Fire but still not sure at this point we
have totally wrapped our minds around that. We are extremely grateful
to all our friends and running peeps who were so supportive during that
time. It is a bizarre and surreal occurrence to go through, and one we
hope to never repeat in our lifetimes. Kathleen was at home when the firestorm broke containment over the Front Range and down into Mountain Shadows. The images she saw leaving home will forever be etched into her memory. The wall of fire was so large and moving so fast, she could only describe it as being special effects from a movie, yet it was not. The fact is, we are fortunate
and blessed that we are not sitting in a strange environment today planning to
rebuild our lives from scratch. We know people who are, and it is a
dark spot to be in, yet those we have had contact with are handling it
with such grace ... and that is inspiring. Sometimes the depths of tragedy exposes the strength of human character.

We have a lot of photos we
took on our first visit through the "war zone" - those handful of areas
where it seems entire streets and blocks vaporized. It takes your
breath away to see it, and the images on TV had done nothing to prepare
us for the gut punch that it is to stand in front of an ash pile that is
the memories of several hundred families. We took the pictures more as
a reminder of our blessings, rather than something to post on the
blog. But processing through those images has helped us a lot with
processing what has happened to our community in this corner of town.
We have lived in this neighborhood nearly 20 years, and can picture in
our mind's eye many if not most of those homes and streets as they were
before June 26. Yet every day now we drive out of our neighborhood with
the new reality of charred sticks dotting the Front Range, and chimneys
left as the sole reminder of the memories of many families. They say routine has a centering or healing effect after trauma - starting to get back to normal has been good in a cleansing sort of way.

Might not ever get around to that "thought gathering" post but getting back to normal, even if it is the "new normal", feels good for now...

7 comments:

I read something about someone's house on a certain street being only 1 of like 3 that were left standing. The woman whose house it was said she'd rather it burned so she could rebuild with her community as a whole. I just can't imagine how frightening the whole ordeal was. Glad to hear you guys are getting out and enjoying God's grand creation again; that's why he created these amazing places for us. And now I bet you can't help but think about those fires while out there playing; make you never take nature for granted again, I bet.

And no way better than a calf burning, lung busting climb up Barr Trail :). I was glad to see your ascent time wasn't in like 50 minutes - I love that you are human :). When I was at Barr Camp last (March), we saw ONE other guy there. Summer attracts the masses.

I had some bad side lung thingie on Leadville - every time I took a deep breathe, the side would sting. If you find out any info, let me know. Mine is probably different but wow that hurt. Still does from time to time...just doing nothing even.

LOVED my Grit's at Leadville; they surprised me as I was having some issues with my little toe blistering with them before. But nothing on race day. Hope they're working well for you.

I'm so glad you did this run and even happier you blogged about it! This, and my hard race the other day, made me realize that PPM was not to be for me this year. I know now why I didn't get in. I just won't be ready for it this year. Awesome run with awesome views, thanks! I love the bags of flour! :D

You've been in my thoughts so much. I can only try to understand what you and others must have been through and how some are still trying to cope with the loss of their homes. Tragedies like this don't happen without reason and i think we must just try to get stronger when it happens.

I really enjoyed hearing about this run (though I'm sorry about your lungs; hopefully it's temporary)! You and Kathleen are such inspirations and I echo the gratitude in this post. We were camping in the mountains with our kids this weekend, and I thought a lot about how lucky we are to live where we do and how we can't take any of the beauty for granted.

Good post. Scary pictures even knowing it came out okay for you two. I am sure you do feel blessed every day and don't take it for granted. I try not to take the beauty around me for granted and this is a good reminder of that. I have been away (again) and it is always so good to come home where I love it so much. Years ago my husband's home burned to the ground and he has a big appreciation for what all that entails. He actually quit his job and became a builder as a result of it so it was a huge life changing experience for him in more than one way.Hope your lungs improve. Is Kathleen still not running? Boo hoo if so. I am wearing my bondis now and loving them. Running is going well but tonight I may have done too much with my wrist. Came home to a non working refrigerator and needed to get rid of all the spoiled food which was everything. You can probably relate to that. I am guessing there was no electricity when you evacuated. Keep running and biking and enjoying your wonderful environment.

Nice run. My wife has been having some allergy issues this summer that tighten up her lungs - maybe something similar? I'll have to look into the Brooks, I just got on a pair of Brooks Adrenaline ASR9 and they seem good so far, but yours look better for long days!

Hey guys,So glad your home was not destroyed in the fire. Just thought I would send you quick note but couldnt find your email on your blog.

I am trying to find a few pacers for Leadville. Not sure if this might interest you or if you might know someone in the running community out there that might be into moving slowly with a grumpy runner. You can shoot me an email at c_mcpeake@hotmail.com if you like.

About Us

We love trail running and biking in the mountains of Colorado and the desert Southwest. We enjoy spending time together, seeing new places, and meeting people who enjoy the outdoors like we do! We were thrown a little bit of a curve ball in March 2011 when Kathleen was diagnosed with Graves Disease, an auto-immune thyroid disorder. After trying to treat the disease with an anti-thyroid drug for a year and not achieving the results we had hoped for, she had radio-active iodine treatment (RAI) in February 2012 and is now in "wait and see" mode. We hope to have her back up and heading toward normal function some time during the summer of 2012 and back to true Happy Trailing. It has caused a little change of pace (slower) and a bit of a temporary life 'detour'. This is new and unexpected territory so the journey should be interesting, challenging, and hopefully still fun!
'To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.'
Ecclesiastes 3:1

Graves Disease Foundation

Do all the good you can, By all the means you can, In all the ways you can, In all the places you can, At all the times you can, To all the people you can, As long as ever you can.-John Wesley

We will miss our sweet girl, Sage

Dec 1997 - Jun 2010

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